Here’s a great example: For the same number of calories that are in a handful of peanuts (about two ounces), you can eat 2½ pounds of strawberries (about five of those green boxes that strawberries come in.) Eating “big” foods like strawberries, salads, and other fruits and vegetables can prevent hunger from taking over and taking you places you don’t want to go
Thank you for this meal plan. It is exactly what I needed and having the shopping list was great. It made me see that I needed to cut portions, eat better, and skip or significantly moderate sweets and alcohol. I have made some minor substitutions like doubling broccoli because I don’t like Brussels sprouts, but for the most part sticking to the plan. I expected to feel hungry and don’t with the snacks.
Thank you for this meal plan. It is exactly what I needed and having the shopping list was great. It made me see that I needed to cut portions, eat better, and skip or significantly moderate sweets and alcohol. I have made some minor substitutions like doubling broccoli because I don’t like Brussels sprouts, but for the most part sticking to the plan. I expected to feel hungry and don’t with the snacks.
Different foods have different nutritional values, even if they sometimes have the same number of calories. And making a few simple food swaps could be beneficial for both your health and your waistline. Felicia Stoler, RD, an exercise physiologist, suggests swapping margarine for butter, corn oil for soybean oil, corn-fed proteins for grass-fed proteins, and artificial egg whites for farm fresh eggs. “Smart consumers are choosing grass-fed options because those tend to have more nutrients and fewer added hormones,” Stoler says.

To prep his patients for success, Dr. Seltzer tells them to plan around a large evening meal by eating a lighter breakfast and lunch—NBD since most people who eat a meal before bed tend to wake up feeling relatively full, he says. Research suggests balanced bedtime meals may also promote steady next-day blood sugar levels, which also helps with appetite regulation.

Trim Portions. If you did nothing else but reduce your portions by 10%-20%, you would lose weight. Most of the portions served both in restaurants and at home are bigger than you need. Pull out the measuring cups to get a handle on your usual portion sizes, and work on paring them down. Get instant portion control by using small bowls, plates, and cups, says Brian Wansink, PhD, author of Mindless Eating. You won't feel deprived because the food will look plentiful on dainty dishware.

If you eat a carbohydrate-rich meal (lots of pasta, rice, bread, or French fries, for example), your body releases insulin to help with the influx of all this glucose into your blood. As well as regulating blood sugar levels, insulin does two things: It prevents your fat cells from releasing fat for the body to burn as fuel (because its priority is to burn off the glucose) and it creates more fat cells for storing everything that your body can’t burn off. The result is that you gain weight and your body now requires more fuel to burn, so you eat more. Since insulin only burns carbohydrates, you crave carbs and so begins a vicious cycle of consuming carbs and gaining weight. To lose weight, the reasoning goes, you need to break this cycle by reducing carbs.
The researchers hypothesize that participants who abstained from animal products dropped significantly more pounds since plant-based foods include loads of filling fiber and slow-to-digest complex carbs. Though more research is needed to confirm these results, the study authors write, "Vegetarian diets appeared to have significant benefits on weight reduction compared to non-vegetarian diets."
The degree to which exercise aids weight loss is open to debate, but the benefits go way beyond burning calories. Exercise can increase your metabolism and improve your outlook—and it’s something you can benefit from right now. Go for a walk, stretch, move around and you’ll have more energy and motivation to tackle the other steps in your weight-loss program.
Becky–this is a great quick start plan. I want to lose 5 pounds I put on after a recent weight loss. It’s very balanced with lots of plant protein as well as animal protein. My only comment is that it’s a lot of fiber very quickly, and I know that this would cause me intestinal pain, especially from raw veggies. It’s so advantageous to have these available by prepping, so I will eat smaller portions (1cup carrots is too much for me at 120 lbs), chew them well and eat slowly and save the rest in case I am still hungry before the next meal! For people who are used to eating more food, I’m wondering if they are able to handle the fiber better than someone like me who has already learned to cut way back on portion sizes!